


Ritual

by deathwailart



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/F, Female Friendship, Implied Relationships, Ritual Combat, Sparring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-20
Updated: 2013-12-20
Packaged: 2018-01-05 07:59:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1091510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathwailart/pseuds/deathwailart
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"But you do as your queen commands."<br/>"I do."<br/>"Then I command it."</p>
<p>Written for the prompt: Frigga and Sif, 'ritualised combat'.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ritual

Once her hair was as gold as Frigga's before Loki took a knife and cut it. The idea was not entirely his own – it was impulse as so many of Loki's 'plans' tend to be. Little thoughts filed away, a whisper here, a look there, all done on a whim of snap decisions. She had complained once of it, of how all spoke of her fine spun gold, the colour of the wheat that gave life with those _looks_ she had detested, that awkward phase of hating and loving being a woman all at once, envious of the ease at which the young men were given weapons where she always had to fight and demand, had to throw herself against wall after wall. She knew it was Loki when she woke with only strands of gold clinging to the pillow for who else could sneak in such a manner? Her mother had screamed and everyone knew even then who to go to for mischief, Thor had been outraged and had bellowed and raged as Fandral, Volstagg and Hogun had followed trying to keep the peace. But Frigga?  
  
Frigga had given her a scarf to wrap around her head, spun by her own fair hand, sharing a secret smile. She knew full well how Sif and Loki had shared a connection and tension even then. It's very different to the one between her and Thor but she cannot explain it to Fandral who has a maid on each arm in celebration, Volstagg married with children, Hogun who is so overjoyed now to be able to return to live amongst his people as he chooses and least of all Thor who at times seems a stranger. She doesn't know how she wants him to look upon her – sometimes as a shield sibling who would fight and die for her realm, for her king and future king, for one who sweats and bleeds alongside her when they go into battle with their wolf smiles, always so hungry but mindful in the heat of the moment. Sometimes she wants to be the confidante he needs even if she knows full well how greatly his words would wound her – she knows only of this Jane through what he has said and what she saw and though she is no great scholar, she knows that she can never fully comprehend a mortal from another realm. It was perhaps easier when they were worshipped even if she had to hit a lot of people who joked about the bride of Thor and forced herself to keep her chin proud when the All-Father would look upon her where she knelt on bended knee before him alongside the warriors three, a few paces behind Thor. Midgard then, before Thor tasted mortality (she hears it in Loki's voice and sometimes has to force herself not to bat him away when he tried different forms and would slither up to wrap about her arm, forked tongue and slitted eyes) was a simpler place. There was blood and warfare, brave souls and epic poems.  
  
Their world is a very confusing place.  
  
Other times again she wants to be what the mortals said, wanted to be the warrior queen next to Thor – she was no fool and she saw no shame in admitting he was tall and proud and golden, that she had admired him as he had admired her when they tended to their wounds and dressed and bathed before each other on their adventures. Alone in her chambers when she chooses – for all that Fandral has many loves across the realms he knows of and especially so in Asgard she knows he beds far fewer than he kisses because they need that time alone with their thoughts, when the high of victory fades so that every bruise aches more than it has any right to – she can imagine him there. The imaginings aren't so good because she sometimes feels she is betraying something by doing it, by imagining undoing his armour with a grin not a grimace, running her fingers over his skin just because she can and not because she seeks a hurt that cannot be seen by the eyes. She thinks it would be wild and unbridled, both of them laughing, covered in scratches and bruises at the eye, the room destroyed. She wants him to look at her the way he must  
  
Sif still has the scarf locked away in a gilded box and she runs her fingers across it on the times she wants only soft and delicate things, when no amount of mead or magic or soothing balms will take away the aches she carries with her from battle, when she sleeps and remembers waking with golden hair upon her pillow.  
  
Her friendship with Loki has always been different to the one with Thor because they were always something of the odd ones in their group, at least until Sif rose tall and strong, a warrior as fierce and reckless as the rest. But once she was a maid with hair almost as dark as Loki's that still made her blink with confusion in the mirror each morning and Loki was young and fey and couldn't wait to show them all a spell, his face lighting up when the All-Father wasn't there to cast comparisons. A tree will not grow as it should when cast in the shade of another but the All-Father never saw that. Loki could annoy her like no other but she had private lessons with him because Loki would never grow in the image of Odin and Thor – he would not be a man with broad shoulders and bulk, his muscle would be like those of a creature that moves with grace and speed, long and lean. Sif had trained enough that her shoulders were almost as broad as his with muscle of her own, smooth and toned, holding her own time and time again. At first in the training yard they hadn't bothered trying and had muttered that they already had valkyries, what need did they have of her? Then, when she had trounced them with greater skill and speed they had become angrier, embarrassed at some maid leaving them in the dirt as Thor, Volstagg, Fandral and Hogun all laughed and cheered for her. Loki had watched from the shadows, training as was expected of a son of Odin but never enjoying it, always told he wasn't fighting the correct way. Quick sly Loki who found each and every one of your weak spots and went for them in a fight, who wasn't afraid to fight dirty.  
  
Sif disagreed. You fought in the style that favours you but when Loki looked to her in support she was ashamed that she turned away and folded her arms. Her position too tentative to do anything else and their friendship took a sharper turn, Loki finding insults and slights that somehow managed to worm their way beneath her armour and Sif knowing just how to cut him to the quick. Sif trained and soon it was Thor, Loki, Lady Sif and the Warriors Three and she stood tall and proud by the throne and won great acclaim, boasts made about her, glasses raised in her honour.  
  
There are three who could be said to know all in Asgard: Heimdall, the All-Father and Loki. Sif privately disagrees at times with the All-Father being on that list given how close she is to the royal family, how closely she has watched Thor and Loki and fought and laughed and lived beside them and she thinks it should be Frigga on that list. But perhaps it's in not being on that list that allows Frigga to know as much as she does or maybe Sif is blinded herself by her own love for the woman and loyalty to her. It isn't seemly, supposedly, for Frigga to be fighting but she taught Loki how to finally stop overextending his reach, at least in battle and not his ambitions and Sif's heart will always grieve for that friend she lost piece by piece long before he ever grabbed for Asgard's throne. She grieved for what she hadn't know she would miss so dearly when she left the table that night in her gown cut to look almost like the mail she wore, Frigga's firm soft hand startling her.  
  
Even after all she had done, it was impossible at least then to forget that he was someone who'd made her laugh and that they'd trained against one another in secret, lips curling into smirks and satisfied snarls. She doesn't let herself think on what might have been – she cannot do to Loki what has already been done, comparing him against the brother she loved first but there was something there, something that twisted in her gut, that lit some spark that made her wary when she was with Loki, when the insults and sniping got more and more personal, when a danger found its way to his hand and her own found their way to the hilt of her sword or pushed him up against something, eye to eye and nose to nose, the barest inch apart with his tunic collar tight in her grasp.  
  
Frigga had given her a place and time and instructions and clad in light armour, weapons hidden beneath the warm drape of a cloak, Sif finds herself hovering before knocking. A whisper of Loki's voice worms its way into her ear and she shakes it away, knocks, waits and enters.  
  
"My queen," she greets, bowing her head respectfully though she's smiling more than she would normally. It's easy to be around Frigga, Frigga who helped Sif relearn her softness after years of despairing and turning herself into something that was not her. _Do not let it twist you_ , she had said to a young warrior with bitter tears hiding behind the trees after a day of training and her mother 'gently hinting' that she should reconsider all this, _You can be two things at once._ Sif suspects that it has long been a mantra from a mother in the house of Odin.  
  
"Frigga here Sif, how long have I known you?" The smile is small and indulgent and Sif shrugs off her cloak, taking the time to look around the room – it's part of Frigga's private suite and her memories of it are faint given that she only came here when sneaking around with Thor and Loki when they were all in cahoots, caught each and every time. The room is like much of Asgard – gold and glittering, floating drapes, ornate decoration in a way that doesn't look as intrusive as it should but they aren't staying, Frigga is beckoning for Sif to follow her so she does, out an archway and into a courtyard surrounded by tall trees, Frigga's gown whispering as she moves.  
  
"I've never been here before," Sif says quietly as she stretches her arms high above her head, Frigga smiling.  
  
"Very few have – when I came to Asgard and married Odin I asked for a place that would be mine. Heimdall is kind enough not to look and my sons only came in my company when they wished to. Even the All-Father would not trespass here."  
  
Sif does not doubt that for a moment. "My q- Frigga, why have you brought me here?"  
  
"We are cut off from so much – how long has it been since you last stopped, when you were not preparing for the next battle, when did you last hear the great silence of peace?"  
  
"Is peace silent?"  
  
Frigga smiles and Sif knows it's the right answer. "We must always be vigilant." They all know Frigga's gift and Sif feels a swell of pride that cuts through all that she has studiously avoided thinking about since the destruction of the Bifrost. "You remember don't you, the lessons I taught you."  
  
"Of course, is that why we are here?" Frigga nods and Sif feels a panic grip her even as she watches Frigga produce two long, shining daggers. "But my queen, it is improper – I am a warrior, I am no longer a girl-"  
  
"But you do as your queen commands."  
  
"I do."  
  
"Then I command it."  
  
Just like that there is a blade at her throat, tilting her chin up, regal, elegant Frigga with one brow raised as Sif unsheathes her blade and both women share a look before they pace away from one another. Sif revels in the chaos of conflict – she doesn't go seeking it as Thor did, she's not a berserker by any stretch of the imagination but it's when she feels alive, her heart pounding out the same rhythm as ancient war drums, her blood burning.  
  
It's arrogance – Sif can admit to that within her own head – that has her thinking she will have the advantage here; she is younger, she is a warrior, she is clad in armour but soon Frigga is upon her, spinning and turning, matching Sif blow for blow, the ring of steel on steel making Sif feel alive again. When one of Frigga's blades taps her cheek, the flat of the blade so cold it makes her jump, her eyes go wide and Frigga's smile is a wolf smile.  
  
It ends in a draw, with Frigga summoning her handmaids back at her room to soothe aches and pains. They agree to meet again. And again. And again. Sif becomes bold and it becomes clear that Frigga is honing skills perhaps dulled from lack of use because one day she gets Sif flat on her back, Sif's sword arm pinned and the blade once again beneath her chin, enough that Sif can feel the pressure when she tries to swallow.  
  
When she yields, she doesn't recognise her own voice. She can hardly breathe, gazing up at Frigga who looks like a valkyrie now, so fierce and golden and Sif has always know the metaphors of fighting – that it's a dance, that it's vital and alive and she has always been able to read bodies so well. She tips her head back in supplication and can see Frigga smile and it takes a long moment before she is pulled to her feet, pulled right up against Frigga, her heart pounding before she drops to her knees and bows her head.  
  
"My queen," she murmurs and looks up from beneath her eyelashes. "Would you command this?"  
  
"Only," it is the least composed she has ever heard Frigga, the catch of her breath in her throat, "if you are willing."  
  
Sif's answer is her smile as she moves to unlace Frigga's boots.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a blend of the films, possibly what bits of the comics I've picked up from tumblr graphics and scouring the wiki as well as bits of the myths too, all of it twisted together. The implied relationships are really because Jaimie Alexander has chemistry with everyone.
> 
> This is the first time I've written Marvel anything in a very long time and I really hope none of it sounds anti-Jane - it's more the differences between Asgardians and Midgardians and how much Midgard has changed since the days they were considered to be Gods.


End file.
